Support is provided to partially cover the travel expenses of selected US participants of the 2010 International Symposium on Flexible Automation, which will be held in Tokyo, Japan on July 12-14, 2010. The funds will support a total of about 20 researchers from the US to attend the symposium. The Symposium will consist of three days of technical presentations and keynote speeches, followed by post-symposium technical tours to major university research laboratories and industry production facilities in Japan. This grant will stimulate the technical discussion among researchers in the field and foster future collaborations. The benefits to the U.S. researchers attending the symposium will include the knowledge gained from the technical presentations and discussions on various processes and systems and underlying principles of flexible automation.
Japan is one of the world leaders in nano-manipulation, nano-machining, robotics and control, sensors, system analysis and integration, the support will enable many researchers (faculty, post-doctoral fellows and graduate students), scientists and engineers from U.S. to gain the first-hand knowledge of research, development, and implementation of flexible automation technologies in Japan.
The symposium, "Flexible Automation" sponsored by ISCIE and ASME, refers to automation technologies essential to meet the increasing requirements of modern manufacturing. Research in this area plays a critical role in advanced manufacturing, which consists of agility, reconfigurability, networked CAD/CAM, 3D-CAD, CE, rapid prototyping, ERP, PDM, SCM, cell production, e-manufacturing, intelligent automation, RFID, health monitoring, security, sensor and actuator technologies, MEMS, haptics, mechatronics, automotive systems, intelligent control for automobiles, virtual environments for development of vehicle control systems, precision systems , systems integration and the protection of the environment. The sympsoium was held in Tokyo, Japan. Partial travel support was provided to US conference participants covering the travel expenses to Japan to facilitate the exchange of research findings. Papers submitted to the symposium went through a peer review process. Of 42 originally submitted papers from US, 31 papers were accepted. 28 researchers from US were awarded the travel grant. Site visits to Japanese companies were also made available to participants. These companies were: Nissan Motor Co., Makino Milling Machine, Fanuc Ltd., Mori Seiki Co., Nippon Steel Coorporation. The benefits to the U.S. researchers attending the symposium include the knowledge gained from the technical presentations and site visits, and discussions on various processes and systems and underlying principles of flexible automation. Furthermore, these knowledges will be passed to a more general audiance through research group meetings, classrooms and short courses that these researchers are committed to.
